Happy Black History Month! There are many incredible organizations in Austin fighting for social justice, racial equity, and preserving and furthering Black culture in our community. Here are 5 organizations you can celebrate this month, and one easy way to support them today: DONATE. 1. African-American Youth Harvest Foundation “Through our programs, nearly 9,000 youth and adults have received services at our flagship African American Youth Resource Center. We have also helped 49 juvenile offenders enroll in our mentoring program, and nearly 2,000 youth and adults have attended our conferences, where we seek to improve our community by focusing on supporting and strengthening the family unit and addressing preconceived notions of minority youth.” Their mission: To effectually address disparities and ensure low-barrier access to vital educational, economic, and enrichment resources to underserved, at-risk youth and their families on their path to self-sufficiency. DONATE to African American Youth Harvest Foundation to improve our community by elevating our minority youth. 2. Austin-Area Urban League The Austin Area Urban League is a historic civil rights organization dedicated to providing economic empowerment, educational opportunities and the guarantee of civil rights for African Americans and other underserved/underrepresented populations in the Austin/ Central Texas region. Their mission: To enable African Americans and other underserved urban residents to secure economic self-reliance, parity, power, and civil rights, and to provide tools for them to build a foundation for social and economic equality. DONATE to Austin-Area Urban League to help build healthy foundations for equity in our community. 3. […]
Read MoreEquity is at the center of the Success By 6 ATX Coalition vision
Co-authored by Jelina Tunstill (CAN) and Laura Olson (GAVA), members of the Success By 6 Leadership Team and Success By 6 Equity Team. United Way for Greater Austin proudly serves as the convening organization for the Austin/Travis County Success By 6 Coalition. The first five years of a child’s life are a critical period when 90 percent of all brain development occurs. What happens in these early years has a lasting impact from birth to Kindergarten readiness, to high school graduation and beyond. In 2012, Success By 6 ATX formed a coalition to transform Austin/Travis County’s early childhood system through a Strategic Plan (originally called the School Readiness Action Plan). Today, the Success By 6 ATX Coalition (SX6) has grown and continues to make progress on the goals we have set. We are coordinating programs and actions to ensure that every child born in the Austin area receives the support and care they need during the first 2,000 days of their life, an essential time for development. We seek to ensure success not only for children, but also for the long term economic health of our community. In 2021, SX6 will be leaning into race equity work as a priority for our coalition. To get beyond the buzzwords of racial equity and put real action behind intention will require alignment with our coalition, state leaders, funders, and local decision-makers to affirm: When it comes to the much-touted ideal of “child-centered” planning, supports, and care, children and families of color count […]
Read MoreAn interview with Emerging Leaders Co-Chair, Kaisha Morton
Photo above: Emerging Leaders Emily Gonzales, Kaisha Morton, and Jeremiah Bentley. At United Way for Greater Austin, we are committed to fighting poverty and racism in our communities. These forces are so interconnected, we cannot address one without the other. This week we caught up with Kaisha Morton, one of our new Emerging Leaders Co-Chairs and User Experience Recruiter and Women@ Social Impact Co-lead at Google to talk to her about diversity, equity, and inclusion in our community. Kaisha is a champion for creating a diverse workforce in our community to help break intergenerational poverty. Check out our interview with Kaisha Morton to learn more about her work and her passion for creating a more diverse and inclusive community. “I believe that diversity, equity, and inclusion are extremely important because all three of those are connected, but true equity in our society won’t happen unless we’re thinking about those three pillars. My work as an educator and also as a recruiter really highlighted for me that the gaps that exist early on for people who may live in poverty, especially communities of color, continue to widen as people progress in their lives and in their careers. I think that the layer of thinking through diversity, equity, and inclusion in all facets of life is something that I will always be passionate about.” -Kaisha Morton Want to know more about Kaisha Morton? How long have you lived in Austin? I moved to Austin from the D.C. area about two years ago. […]
Read MoreChampions of change: Link Up Austin amplifies the voice of young parents for good
Young parents with low income experience a great deal of financial instability, and their poverty rate is nearly triple the national average. Thanks to funding from the Annie E. Casey Foundation, United Way for Greater Austin and the Austin/Travis County 2-Gen Coalition are on a mission to support the needs of these young parents and create a social services ecosystem that promotes economic mobility for generations to come. One of the ways we are making this happen is through Link Up Austin. The group is a place for parents, ages 18-24, to connect with one another and grow their leadership skills. These young adults face many unique challenges that older parents do not. The labor market is rapidly changing, and often younger parents have not had the time to get the education, experience, or perspective needed to navigate their careers while focusing on the daily tasks of raising young children. The cohort of nine parents is co-designing a pilot to help remove barriers for young parents in the workforce, education, and beyond. For example, providing flexible child care will allow parents to attend classes, in-person or asynchronously, and give them equal access to pursue education. Equal access to education is important because the likelihood of a child succeeding later in life is still affected by the education and income levels of his or her parents. Link Up Austin is designed to listen to the needs of young parents in our community and then work with them to create solutions that […]
Read MoreKeeping the movement going together, even when we’re apart
At United Way ATX we are committed to doing the hard work, internally and in our community, of confronting racism. Our mission is to bring together people, ideas and resources to fight poverty in our community, and we we can most effectively fight poverty when we stand up for racial equity. Internally, we are 18 months into a deep dive on diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI) and have been doing hard, introspective work on our shortcomings as an organization and finding innovative and inclusive solutions to continue moving forward in an open and equitable way. During this time, our team has been committed to transformation and growth, to keep learning and unlearning and to create safe spaces for our team to thrive. Since transitioning to working in the virtual space we’ve enjoyed staying connected on our DEI goals through resource sharing. #BlackLivesMatter to us, every single day, and our team is committed to the movement, not the moment. Three members of our Diversity, Equity and Inclusion Committee have volunteered to share some of their favorite resources that have made an impact on them. _______________________________________________________________________ Jordan Gutierrez-Ramirez | Corporate Volunteer Manager, United Way for Greater Austin Resource: In Bold Company, a community “Let’s be honest, the past few months haven’t been easy. Whether we are aware of it or not, systemic racism is something we live with every day, and as a brown woman it has been heartbreaking to see what is happening to the Black community both right now and […]
Read More